Wednesday, September 2, 2009

Disney buys Marvel: Is this a sign of the Apocalypse?

Followers of “Tales from the Carport Kwoon” know that I tend to venture off into a wide range of subjects, no matter how tangentially they are connected to martial arts or fitness. In previous posts, I’ve proclaimed my preference for The Green Hornet over Batman and mourned the passing of “Kung Fu” star, David Carradine and “Enter the Dragon” villain, Shek Kin.

Most recently, I appealed to my fellow gun owners, no matter how you feel about the health care debate or about President Barack Obama, to leave your guns at home when you go to public meetings. You’re only playing into the hands of those who would like to obliterate the right to keep and bear arms.

Today, I’ll be commenting on Disney’s buyout of Marvel Comics Group for $4 billion. What do comic books have to do with martial arts? Well, martial artists are notorious comic book fans and comic fans are major lovers of martial arts in film and TV. I personally know three black belts who’ve owned or managed comic book stores.

I also know comic books have inspired many young men to enter the gym and build up their muscles in an effort to look like their favorite characters. Former professional wrestler and one-half of the champion tag team, The Killer Bees, B. Brian Blair, once admitted to me that his love of Superman was what started him on his own physical fitness kick.

Pro-wrestler Brian Blair, left, said his desire to be like Superman inspired him to hit the gym.

If you’re looking for an easy answer about whether Disney’s purchase of Marvel is a good thing, stop now. There are few easy answers in life and you’re not going to find it here.

I’ve been a longtime fan of both Marvel and Disney. I grew up with Disney in my house, primarily because of my father. I had paperbacks and comics featuring Disney characters as a small child. When I adopted my son, the first place my father took him was to Walt Disney World.

The first Marvel Comic I ever owned.

When I was seven, I was hooked on Marvel Comics, especially with the purchase of Marvel Spotlight issue five, the first appearance of the Ghost Rider. Today, I have a collection of between 3,000 and 4,000 comics. At least two-thirds of that collection consists of Marvels.

First, lets look at some of the cons of Tuesday’s purchase by Disney. The Disney company is synonymous with “family entertainment.” Of course, family entertainment is pretty much a euphemism for “toning down and dumbing down entertainment for the palatability of small children.”

Perhaps the worst example is Disney’s version of “The Hunchback of Notre Dame,” a very dark tale by Victor Hugo, and turning into the usual song and dance production.

Not the only, but perhaps the most egregious example of how Disney has taken dark, gothic literature and toned it down for children.

But it doesn’t end with “Hunchback.” Disney has taken many classic tales from the public domain and adapted them for screenplays, especially fairy tales like “Snow White”, “Cinderella”, “Alice in Wonderland” and “The Little Mermaid.” Anyone familiar with the original stories, as recounted by The Brothers Grimm and Lewis Carroll, knows that they were also much darker, much more gruesome, than Disney would have you believe.

Meanwhile, Marvel has a well-deserved reputation for pushing the envelope. Even when under the restrictive Comics Code Authority, they loved to see what they could get away with. They even exerted pressure on the CCA to ease up on some of their standards. For example, the Code originally prohibited depictions of occult figures, especially “living dead” creatures like vampires and zombies.

Only under pressure from Marvel Comics did the Comics Code Authority ease up on their rules to allow horror comics, like these featuring Dracula and Frankenstein's moster, to hit the newstands.

In 1972, Marvel got the code to ease up on that restriction, and released a number of horror comics, including “Tomb of Dracula” and “The Monster of Frankenstein.”

In one famous incident, Marvel released “The Amazing Spider-Man” number 96 without the Code’s seal. At the time, the Code forbade any mention of drug abuse, even if it was anti-drug. But Marvel’s editor-in-chief and co-creator of most of its superheroes, Stan Lee, was asked to do an anti-drug story by the White House. When he asked the Code for permission to do a story about Peter Parker’s friend, Harry Osborne struggling with drug addiction, the Code said “no.”

Quick! What's missing from this cover?

Lee was shocked that they would say no even though this request came from the President himself. So Lee shocked the industry by releasing that issue without the seal.

But Marvel has pushed the envelope in other ways, ways that seem incredibly minor today but were shocking when they happened. The company gave us heroes like The Punisher, Wolverine and Blade the Vampire Slayer, who didn’t share other heroes self-imposed restrictions on killing bad guys. In X-Men 116, Wolverine fatally dispatched a sentry who was guarding an enemy’s hide-out. The reader doesn’t see the killing, but the horrified look on Nightcrawler and Storm’s faces leaves no doubt as to what happened.

In the 1980’s, while still operating under the Code, Marvel pushed the limits in another, then-shocking way in the pages of the Fantastic Four, showing husband and wife characters, Mr. Fantastic and the Invisible Woman sharing a bed. Horror of horrors! A married couple in the same bed! You'd think they were answering the question about whether Mr. Fantastic could stretch all parts of his body!

Though it should be noted that the same taboo wasn’t broken on prime time network TV until the 1970’s when Mike and Carol Brady were shown sharing a bed on “The Brady Bunch.”

Still, The Fantastic Four pushed a lot of boundaries. Long before the Simpsons, they were the first dysfunctional family in comics. The FF dealt with everything from marital infidelity, divorce, domestic violence and even child abuse just among its members.

Perhaps the other way Marvel pushed the envelope was with the vocabulary used by its characters. When Marvel was started, the general rule in comics was to avoid three-syllable words. Four syllable words were pretty much verboten.

But Lee considered himself a writer, first and foremost. He wanted characters and stories which appealed to adults. His critics once derided him by saying that a kid would need a dictionary to get through a Marvel Comic.

Lee responded that there are worse things to do to a kid than make him look up a word in the dictionary.

Of course today, Lee and Marvel are still going strong. Can rival companies, like Gold Key, Atlas or Charlton say the same?

So where do things go now? Will we see The Punisher forced to load his M16 with tranquilizer darts? Will Wolverine be forced to sheathe his claws? Stay tuned, folks.

And come back here tomorrow for the pros of Disney’s purchase of Marvel.

About Me

For most of my adult life, I have worked as a professional writer, journalist, editor and photojournalist. My work has appeared in a number of newspapers, magazines, books and blogs, including: The Tampa Tribune; The St. Petersburg Times; USF Magazine; FIGHT!; Black Belt; Inside Kung Fu; The Advisor; The Caroler and many others.
I live in Tampa, Florida with my wife, Roxanne, our son, Vitaly and several quadrupeds.